Is it real, is it fake, what is ‘Fake News’?
Misinformation, or as the current administration calls it, “fake news” has grown notoriously popular among politicians and people in the industry but the use of the term, fake news, vaguely defines the current state of news information and belittles the work of journalist and people in the news industry.
According to Ireton and Posetti, manipulation of information has been around long before standards of misinformation were developed and established. Recent developments in technology have forged the weaponization of information and the most recent definition of the term.
In recent years news reporting media has come under a lot of scrutiny. In 2016, Donald Trump attacked journalist and blamed them for the spread of misinformation. His words and actions aimed at journalist and news media notoriously politized the term, fake news, pinning news networks against his supporters and creating mistrust of the industry.
Today Fox has become the conservative go to network and CNN became the liberal network. Both of those networks know that they are constantly being watched and have to keep an agenda that will keep their audience talking and watching. This bias creates a mistrust in media outlets because audiences are becoming seemingly aware of it, leading to an underlying doubt every time they are presented with new information. Opening the door to misinformation and manipulation.
According to Bennet and Livingston, many nations specifically democratic ones have and continue to experience a rise in circulation of false information through social media and political blogging sites structured similar to journalism sites.
The best way to detect and avoid bias news sources and reports is to analyze the information in a fair and accurate manner. As well as holding journalist accountable for everything they report and educating people on fact checking because as it has been seen not everything on the internet can be a reliable source and people should know how to distinguish fake and real news.
The work of journalists and writers has shaped the world and society we live in. Journalist have put their lives at risk in warzones and dangerous areas to give a voice to people, protecting them and the integrity of their work is of vital importance without their work and diligence we’d become victims of oppressors.
